Remember When VW Wanted to Compete With Morgan, But Chickened Out

While Morgan, Vanderhall, and Polaris have traded blows in the three-wheeler market for quite some time, the companies nearly had to compete with the might of Volkswagen in the early aughts with the GX3 concept.

Photo by: Volkswagen

By: Jonathon Klein

Mar 30, at 8:56am ET

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When you think of three-wheelers, you'll like think of three different manufacturers. There's the OG, Morgan, the odd-ball that is Polaris, and the newcomer in the space of Vanderhall. And even in this niche-upon-niche segment, each, however, takes very different approaches to the space.

Morgan maintains the bathub-esque shape and motorcycle powerplant. Polaris went more comfy-cozy, and built what's basically a sports car with three wheels. And Vanderhall? It's front-wheel-drive for some unknown reason. And while more traditional motorcycle-style trikes exist from Harley and Indian, that's about it on the three-wheeler front.

But there was almost a fourth manufacturer. One with the might of Germany's car brand behind it. Have you ever heard of the Volkswagen GX3 concept?

VW GX3 Concept 4

Photo by: Volkswagen

Dug up by our good friends over at The Autopian, Volkswagen's GX3 was the sort of unhinged lunancy you could only put together during the Ferdinand Piech-era of Volkswagen. For those who aren't familiar with the name Piech, good-old Ferdie was a freakin' lunatic and is largely responsible for all of Volkswagen's most insane cars.

Bugatti's rebirth with the Veyron? Piech. Bentley's insane W12 engine? Piech. Cutting off four cylinders of said Bentley engine and throwing it into a mid-size family sedan to make the Passat W8? Piech. The latter of which nearly bankrupted me and caused divorce proceedings. But the list goes on and on thanks to Piech's willingness to say "Yeah, go for it," to almost every single insane idea his team would come up with.

Enter the GX3.

VW GX3 Concept 3

Photo by: Volkswagen

The project was one from a team within Volkswagen called "Moonraker," which is an obvious James Bond reference. But the idea behind the GX3 was to build something that was designed for Americans to embrace smaller mobility. Specifically, as The Autopian reports, to "convert the wishes, dreams and needs of American drivers into mobility." And while SUVs and trucks now dominate the American landscape, at the time of the GX3's debut in 2006, Americans were embracing smaller cars.

Golfs were going hard, Ford's Focus and Fiesta were the things enthusiasts were clamoring for, and Honda's perennial fan-favorite, the Civic, was in its heyday. Morgans, however, were even more niche than today. Polaris hadn't even come up with the Slingshot. And Vanderhall may as well been just a glisten in someone's eye that hadn't even been born yet. But this was peak Piech, so the concept was fully-functional and nearly ready for production.

Powered by a 1.6-liter turbocharged engine from Volkswagen's own Lupo GTI, a hot-hatch that only was sold across the pond, it made 125 horsepower and sent those horses to the rear wheel ala Morgan. It also borrowed the steering rack from one of the best handling cars ever, the Lotus Elise, and weighed just 1,200 pounds wet. Those stats meant it could clip 60 mph in just 5.7 seconds, all while retaining motorcycle-like fuel-sipping MPGs.

VW GX3 Concept 1

Photo by: Volkswagen

What's more, Volkswagen's supposed starting price was basically pennies on the dollar, with a theoretical production price of just $17,000. And it looked weird, but in a sort of weird and wonderful way that only came out of this VW era. But imagine this possible world for a second, as instead of going down the road of Atlas' and Tiguans, we got GX3s and Touaregs and Passat W8s! It'd be a better world, that's for sure.

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Obviously, that didn't come to be. The GX3 never made production, with the problem apparently being that VW's legal department couldn't come to some semblance of understanding whether it was a motorcycle or a car, and jumping through the legal hoops to put it in one category or the other. And that's despite the business case being solid at the time. Honestly, it looks like VW was just a few years too early, as three-wheelers are sold every day through Polaris, Morgan, and Vanderhall.

Simpler, weird, more fun times, right? Take me back.